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Sweet Onion and Rosemary Jam with Sage Butter

Brian and I recently tried out a super hyped-up restaurant here in Chicago, Girl and the Goat. I was a little apprehensive due to the excessive amount of hype over a celebrity chef. I was surprisingly and delightfully wrong and left wondering how on Earth
some of the flavors came together. My number one mission when I left,
was to attempt to reconstruct the onion jam and sage butter we had as an
appetizer (Brian thought I was nuts because it's all I talked about for several days). My gosh was it amazing. Here's my attempt at what I found to
be a delightful start to a meal. It's a great make-ahead dish for holiday entertaining. Just pull it out of the fridge, and serve it!

In a large, thick bottomed pot, heat the butter and oil over
medium low heat. Add all the onion, garlic, rosemary, bay leaf, whole
peppercorns and salt. Give the pot a good stir to make sure the onion is
coated in oil and butter. Cover and let simmer for 35 minutes. This will give the onions time to caramelize and get really sweet and flavorful.

Add the balsamic and red wine vinegars,
white wine, honey and sugar. Add a bit more salt. Give the pot a good
stir and let cook for 20 more minutes, uncovered. Stir the
mixture occasionally to ensure nothing is burning. Adjust temperature as
necessary.

Remove the rosemary sprigs and bay leaf.
Some of the rosemary leaves will have fallen off, but don't worry, leave
them in. The liquid should be reducing at this point. Cook for another
20 minutes (75 minutes total). Taste to see if salt should be adjusted.

Transfer the mixture to a food processor or
blender and give a few quick pulses. You want to break up any rosemary
leaves, and make the jam "spreadable", but not turn it into mush.

While the jam cooks, prepare your sage
butter. Simply heat the butter, sage and salt over low heat. Let cook
together for 5 minutes. Strain through cheesecloth into a small
container and cool in fridge.

Serve the sage butter and onion jam
together on any kind of bread you have! I used a big loaf of freshly
baked, warm multi-grain bread to make the crostini. The jam can also be sealed up and sent off as a wonderful holiday gift!